


trembling behind your tears, a promise

by dotdotmoon



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Howl's Moving Castle Fusion, Alternate Universe - Magic, Kyungsoo's Birthday Week 2021, Laundry, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Multi, Polyamory, References to Depression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-16 05:21:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29077008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dotdotmoon/pseuds/dotdotmoon
Summary: Junmyeon has a meltdown over his hair. Kyungsoo takes offense. Jongdae gets caught in the middle.
Relationships: Do Kyungsoo | D.O/Kim Jongdae | Chen, Do Kyungsoo | D.O/Kim Jongdae | Chen/Kim Junmyeon | Suho, Do Kyungsoo | D.O/Kim Junmyeon | Suho, Kim Jongdae | Chen/Kim Junmyeon | Suho
Comments: 4
Kudos: 34
Collections: Challenge #13 — Like a Movie





	trembling behind your tears, a promise

**Author's Note:**

> very loosely based on _howl's moving castle_ , [this scene](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtdIrbHzV-0) in particular. the title is a line from _the promise of the world_ , the ending song of howl’s moving castle.
> 
> content notes: depiction of mental health issues, namely depression

It hangs over them like a pot squeezed onto an already full rack, threatening to tumble down should a window invite even the smallest of breezes in.

It cloaks them like the film of sweat on Junmyeon's skin, heavy with days spent in bed. Kyungsoo passes one of the sponges softened by hot soapy water in the sink to Jongdae, and they work them over Junmyeon as he sits in the bathtub, head between his knees, dripping water and misery. Jongdae's known him for longer, and Junmyeon's skin turns red under his relentless circles. He climbs into the tub and scrubs over the pink Kyungsoo leaves behind when he gets up to reach for one of the hair potions.

It's Kyungsoo who hits his head on the pot, but it doesn't fall on its own.

It's Junmyeon who throws it when he catches sight of himself in the mirror, of the bold orange of his hair.

Kyungsoo hears his mumbled words, feels them turning into knives slicing through him. He stops patting his hair dry, leaves half of it wet, watches it painting small water paths down Junmyeon's neck and shoulders, evades Jongdae's hands reaching for him.

"How do you think you saying this makes me feel?" he asks when he manages to take a breath that pushes the halves of his heart back together with force. He opens the window and drapes the small towel over it, turns back to see Junmyeon sinking past Jongdae's arms to the floor as his hair takes on a neon hue.

Kyungsoo doesn't linger. He's down the stairs and through the front door before he can get stabbed a second time by any more of his grievances.

_What's the point in living if you aren't beautiful?_ The words ring in his head, poisonous, sharp.

He's sitting on one of the outstretched legs of the castle, the metal warmed by the early spring sun when the castle door opens to Jongdae.

"Did he have a meltdown?" Kyungsoo asks. He'd rather spend the night outside with a blanket of mosquitos, starlight and morning dew than return to any part of the castle asking to be cleaned of sticky slime.

"Right then and there," Jongdae says as he marches over to him. His skin is tinted green up to his elbows, Kyungsoo notices when the table wobbles as he props his hands up on it. “Dragged him into the bathtub before he got started, but the drain is clogged now.”

Kyungsoo’s familiar with the drain. It’s something he can help with, once he’s taken care of his bruised feelings.

"Why aren't you getting some rest?" Jongdae asks. His eyes are following Kyungsoo's hands as they smooth out fabric, fold and stack. He rounds the table and the leg to hold onto Kyungsoo's shoulders from behind as he’s working, like he’d blow away in the breeze if not for an anchor.

"Later," Kyungsoo says. "These clothes aren't folding themselves."

Jongdae makes a displeased noise against his neck. "They might, if you asked them to."

Kyungsoo looks out on the lake, its surface bright and untouched by the breeze that plays in the fields of flowers. "It helps me think," he says.

"Think less then," Jongdae demands with a kiss to the nape of his neck, and he's gone before Kyungsoo can pile some of the laundry into his arms.

As soon as Kyungsoo takes off his coat to fold the bed sheets and leaves it on the castle leg next to him, he finds Junmyeon appearing on it. He sits with his legs crossed, mouth pressed into a thin line, squinting into the pale sunlight. His hair looks almost transparent like this, the roots dark now.

"You put on sunscreen?" Kyungsoo asks into the tension between them. He holds up a sheet to shake it out, then looks over. Junmyeon inhabits his coat like it's the only space outside of the castle he dares to be in, like he'll fold up like a fan the very moment Kyungsoo goes back inside. It must have been weeks since he ventured further than their small balcony.

"I came to apologise,” Junmyeon says, slipping a hand into the already matched up socks Kyungsoo tossed into his lap to check for holes, then balls a first green pair up. Kyungsoo won’t complain if Jongdae doesn’t. “I'm terribly vain when I'm depressed."

"You're surely terrible in some ways,” Kyungsoo tells him.

He doesn't meet his eyes when he passes the first sock sphere back, and it's better this way, a space where only their words count. "I didn't mean to—I shouldn't have said that."

Kyungsoo nods and picks the next socks out of his palm to let them join the basket. "I’d like it if you didn’t say something like that again."

For a moment, Junmyeon looks like he was asked to gut a fish. His gaze softens when Kyungsoo reaches over, deposits more socks on his thigh, then drifts into something so wishful. “We’ll get my heart back, I’ll find a way to break your curse—”

Kyungsoo sighs, but it’s time. He wants to trust that Junmyeon likes him better than the option of an underneath, of his condition coming off like a second skin. “This—it’s not a curse. Never has been.”

It’s tearing the entire pot rack down, and Kyungsoo looks at two fitted sheets folded into rectangles with nervous contours.

Junmyeon laughs, and his face is caught in distressed amusement. “I’ve never broken a curse in my life, and I never might.”

Kyungsoo considers Jongdae’s curse, sitting around his neck in a thin silver line, of Junmyeon’s, hiding somewhere in his pillow, of his own, a shadow between his teeth—how they all fall together in a weave of their own.

And if he asks the castle to lift its leg just so, so Junmyeon slides closer to him, warm and sticky with affection still, no one has to know.

**Author's Note:**

> some notes bc i struggled with the word count for once:
> 
> junmyeon traded off his heart to a fire demon for greater magic powers, only to have said demon run away with his heart and the promised magic.
> 
> kyungsoo has magic of his own that's more similar to sophie in the book. talking to inanimate things sometimes makes them respond to him with according actions. he's the one moving the castle. he wasn't turned into an old man but has a terrible skin condition, it’s up to your interpretation what kind.
> 
> please let me know if you liked this & thank you so much for reading!!
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/dotdotmoon) | [listography](https://listography.com/dotdotmoon) (up-to-date wip list)


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